Flying can be a scary experience for many people who suffer from flight anxiety (aerophobia). However, there are airports around the world that frighten not only passengers, but also the pilots themselves – who prefer not to go there.
These are usually small airports or those located in sites with particularly difficult landing and take-off conditions. According to The Sun, these are the five scariest airports in the world.
Princess Juliana Airport
This port, located in the Dutch part of the island of Sint Maarten, holds the dubious title of one of the most feared landing and take-off runways for pilots. The route is completely adjacent to the coast of Mahe Island, so landing there is very close to the beach and bathers, as well as to the sea itself. This reality has also become a real attraction, with many tourists coming to the beach to experience the strong air currents that come out of the plane engines and wash over the beach.
Because of the airport's proximity to the coast, the authorities banned large planes from landing there in 2016, which were replaced by smaller planes carrying about half the passengers of a large plane. This decision prevented the hair-raising scenes of Boeing 747s almost landing on the beach itself.
Hechi International Airport
Guangxi Autonomous Province, located in southern China, has one of the most beautiful and frightening runways in the world. This is a mountainous region, where in order to build the 677-meter track, an entire area was flattened with huge investment by local entrepreneurs. The runway is 2,200 meters long and 45 meters wide, but in order to land and take off from it, the flight must be lowered abruptly by 300 meters, due to the mountains around the runway. This can be particularly devastating in inclement weather or when the pilot has made an error.
Barra Airport, Scotland
Barra Airport, located in the Scottish Hebrides, is literally located on the island's seafront, so the plane lands on the beach itself. The situation makes it possible to land on this runway only at low tide, because at high tide the runway is below sea level. It is important to note that because of this reality, it is forbidden to land at this airport at night.
Tenzing–Hillary Airport
This airport, also known as Lukla Airport, was declared in 2010 the most dangerous airport in the world. It is located at an altitude of 2,846 meters, including only a short runway, and the winds acting around it constantly change their direction and strength. In addition, the proximity of the Everest mountain range to the route creates many risks in reaching the port.
Moreover, because of the runway's height, it has low air pressure that makes it difficult to land an aircraft as well as take off. For all these reasons, only helicopters and small propeller aircraft are allowed to land on it.
Courchevel Airport
This airport serves the French ski resort of Courchevel in the French Alps. Located at 2,008 metres above sea level, it is the highest airport in Europe, causing landing and take-off difficulties due to air pressure in the region as well as the Alps.
However, to make the airport more challenging, it should be noted that its runway is the smallest in the world, at only 537 meters long. This situation means that the pilot actually has no margin for error, so the runway serves only small aircraft and helicopters.
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